Appointment with Kalidasa

Author(s): G K Bhatt
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 59

Appointment with Kalidasa
a writer chooses to present, the art-form which he imposes on the experience, the thoughts and ideas which take shape through his artistic picture, somehow reveal directly or indirectly the writer's personal predilections, his likes and dislikes, and the values of life he seems to accept and cherish. Milton said, 'A precious literary work is the life-blood of a master-spirit...'. The remark implies, at least, that a literary creation reflects, if not a writer in person, the writer's art-personality, some remarkable and possibly brilliant traits of the inner man. A search for such traits through the literary creations is likely to reveal, not the actual life of a writer but, at least, the image of his thought-life. This is the only purpose for which a comparative study of the legends about Kalidāsa's life and character and his literature is undertaken, although the legends and stories have no historical value and deserve to be dismissed as figments of popular fancy.
The details which relate to the time of Kālidasa are evidently worthless. The list of pine brilliant jewels in the court of king Vikrama or Bhoja brings together poets and theoretical writers who belong to different centuries.» Bhoja lived in the 11th century A. D. and, in spite of a little uncertainty about Kālidāsa's date, Kālidāsa could not have been a contemporary of Bhoja to be the brightest jewel of his court. The relationship between Kālidāsa and Bhavabhūti, assumed by another story,8 bas to be similarly dismissed as an historical anachronism.
There is a possibility that Kālidāsa's association with a royal family or a ruling king, which the legends relate, may have some basic truth. The subject of his three plays and of the epic Raghuvarśa is the life and personality of kings. The pictures in the epic are painted with the idealistic colours of myth and are modeled on the ancient legendary kings. But the royal heroes of his plays are drawn as contemporary models, and Kālidāsa shows not their legendary valour but their private love-life. The personal life of contemporary kings, their behaviour in the royal harem, their love-life, the women in the harem and their intrigues and rivalries, the etiquette of royal court and the code of courtly behaviour, men, women and officers of the king and the formal conventions of their conduct, are all presented with unerring accuracy and freshness, which suggests the poet's personal knowledge of and familiarity with royal life in private and in court. From the literary point of view Kālidāsa could be said to have created the form of a royal courtly comedy of love, or to have given the dramatic form popularity and prestige. It may be presumed, therefore, that Kalidasa did have the opportunity of observing royal and court life first hand and from close quarters.
It does not appear improbable that Kalidasa may have been more closely connected with royal life than a mere observer permitted in royal presence. It is commonly believed that Kalidāsa enjoyed royal patronage, that he was the court-poet (Rājakavi) of some king who had taken the title of Vikramaditya. Kālidāsa may perhaps have been more than an honoured poet of a royal court. The legendary